Exodus 21:8

Exo 21:8 If she please not her master, who hath betrothed her to himself, then shall he let her be redeemed: to sell her unto a strange nation he shall have no power, seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her.

Ver. 8. He hath dealt deceitfully with her.] By not answering her expectation. This God tolerated for the hardness of their hearts, but approved not.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Exo 21:8. Who hath betrothed her to himself — For a concubine, or secondary wife. Not that masters always took maid-servants on those terms. Then shall he let her be redeemed — Either by herself or her friends, or any other person that will redeem her. To sell her to a strange nation he shall have no power — This was prohibited, because a heathen would keep her for a perpetual servant, which the Israelites might not do.

Seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her — In breaking his promise of marriage made to her, or in disappointing the hopes he had encouraged her to entertain of it.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

By giving another money to buy her of him.

Or, deflowered her.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

(8) Who hath betrothed her to himself.—The reading is to be preferred which gives the opposite sense—“who hath not betrothed her;” and the meaning is, “If the man, after purchasing the woman to be his wife, finds that he does not like her, and refuses to go through the ceremony of betrothal”—

Then shall he let her be redeemed.—Heb., then let him cause her to be redeemed: i.e., let him provide some one to take his place, and carry out his contract, only taking care that the substitute be a Hebrew, and not one of “a strange nation,” since her father did not intend to have her wed a foreigner.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

8. First special case under the general law of v. 7: if a woman, bought with the intention of being made her master’s concubine, does not please her master, he must let her be redeemed, and he has no power to sell her into foreign slavery.

who hath designated (2Sa_20:5; Jer_47:7) her for himself] viz. at the time when he bought her: ‘for himself’ is shewn by its position in the Heb. to be emphatic; it is opposed to ‘for his son’ in v. 9, The marg. (לא for לו) may be disregarded, if only because yâ‘ad does not mean to ‘espouse’: to ‘designate’ a woman for any one may indeed be equivalent to ‘to espouse,’ but that does not justify ‘designate,’ used absolutely, being rendered ‘espouse.’

let her be redeemed] by her father, or other relative, if able to do so: she had been bought to become a concubine, and had consequently certain rights. If however the woman’s relatives did not redeem her, her master was apparently at liberty to sell her to another Israelite; for the following clause only forbids him to sell her into foreign servitude. Of course, the woman is not to be supposed to have actually become her master’s concubine: in this case, if he found he did not like her, he would have to give her her freedom unconditionally (cf. v. 11).

strange] foreign, the now obsolete sense of ‘strange’ noticed on Exo_2:22.

deceitfully] or untruly, viz. in not making her his concubine, as it was understood, when he bought her, that he would do.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

If she please not her master,.... "Be evil in the eyes of her master" (p); and he has no liking of her, and love to her, not being agreeable in her person, temper, or conduct, so that he does not choose to make her his wife:

who hath betrothed her to him; but not completed the marriage, as he promised, when he bought her, or at least gave reason to expect that he would; for, according to the Jewish canons, a Hebrew handmaid might not be sold but to one who laid himself under obligation to espouse her to himself, or his son, when she was fit to be betrothed (q); and so Jarchi says, he ought to espouse her, and take her to be his wife, for the money of her purchase is the money of her espousals. There is a double reading of this passage, the Keri, or marginal reading we follow; the Cetib, or written text, is, "who hath not betrothed her", both may be taken in, "who hath not betrothed her to him", as he said he would, or as it was expected he should; for, had she been really betrothed, what follows could not have been done:

then shall he let her be redeemed; she being at age, and fit for marriage, and her master not caring to marry her, her father shall redeem her, as the Targum of Jonathan; it was incumbent on him to do that, as it was on her master to let her be redeemed, to admit of the redemption of her; or whether, as Aben Ezra says, she redeemed herself, or her father, or one of her relations, if she was near the six years (the end of them), they reckoned how many years she had served, and how many were yet to the seventh, or to the time that she is in her own power, and according to the computation was the redemption: thus, for instance, as it is by others (r) put, if she was bought for six pounds, then one pound is the service of every year; and if she redeemed herself, her master took off of the money for the years she had served; or thus (s), if she was bought for sixty pence, and had served two years, he must pay her forty pence, and so free her:

to sell her unto a strange nation, he shall have no power; that is, to another man, as both the Targums of Onkelos and Jonathan, even to an Israelite that was of another family, to whom the right of redemption did not belong; for to sell an Israelite, man or woman, to a Gentile, or one of another nation, was not allowed of in any case, as Josephus (t) observes; but the meaning is, he had no power to sell her to another, though of the same nation, to be his handmaid; this power neither her master nor her father had, as Jarchi asserts, she being redeemed, and in her own power:

seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her; in not fulfilling his promise made to her father when he sold her to him, or not answering the expectation he had raised in her; and especially he dealt thus with her, if he had corrupted her, and yet refused to betroth and marry her.

(p) "mala in oculis", Montanus; "mala videbitur in oculis", Junius & Tremellius; "mala fuerit in oculis", Drusius. (q) Maimon. Hilchot Abadim, c. 4. sect. 11. & in Misn. Kiddushin, c. 1. sect. 2. (r) Bartenora in Kiddush. ib. (s) Maimon. in ib. (t) Antiqu. l. 16. c. 1. sect. 1.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Who hath betrothed her to himself, for a concubine or secondary wife. Not that masters did always take maid-servants upon these terms, as some conceive; but that some did so, and of them this place speaks. Though here is a differing reading; and as the margin hath lo the pronoun, signifying to him, so the text hath lo the adverb, signifying not; and so the text may be translated thus, so that he doth not betroth her, to wit, to himself, or to his son, as he gave her hopes he intended. Either reading or sense is proper and probable.

Then shall he let her be redeemed, either by herself or friends, or any other person that will redeem her.

Quest. How could he part with her, and sell her, when she was betrothed to him?

Answ. 1. This might be one of those many indulgences given to them for the hardness of their hearts; and there is no doubt God could dispense with his own positive laws.

2. The latter reading avoids this difficulty.

To sell her unto a strange nation he shall have no power: this was in general prohibited for all Hebrew servants, but it is particularly mentioned here, because there was special reason for it; both because there was more danger of her corruption in chastity and religion in regard of her sex, and because the master in that case was under a greater temptation of selling her to a foreigner, because no Israelite would buy her, or give so much money for her as a heathen would, who would and might keep her for a perpetual servant, which the Israelites might not do.

He hath dealt deceitfully with her, viz. in breaking his promise of marriage made to her, or blasting the hopes he encouraged her to have of it. The Hebrew words are exactly rendered thus, in dealing deceitfully or falsely with her or against her; and they may be added as an aggravation of that sin of selling her to a strange nation, wherein there was a double false dealing; the one towards God, who by his law forbad this; the other towards her, whom he hired upon other terms, and not with a power to dispose of her contrary to the law and manner of the Israelites.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

8. Please not her master — Hebrews, if she be evil in the eyes of her master. If he discover some defect in her, or find her less attractive and useful to him than he had expected.

Dealt deceitfully with her — The purchase implied the pledge of marriage or concubinage, with its legal rights. These involved obligations which, if not met, exposed to the charge of deceitful dealing.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

If she please not her master. If he decline, i.e. , to carry out the contract, and take her for his wife. Then let her be redeemed. Rather, "Then let him cause her to be redeemed." Let him, i.e. , look out for some one who will buy her of him and take his obligation of marriage off his hands To sell her to a strange nation he shall not have power. Only, this purchaser must be a Hebrew, like himself, and not a foreigner, since her father consented to her becoming a slave only on the condition of her being wedded to a Hebrew. Seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her. By professing to take her as a secondary wife, and not carrying out the contract.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Who hath betrothed her to himself - For a concubine, or secondary Wife. Not that Masters always took Maid-servants on these terms.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

אם רעה בעיני אדניה IF SHE BE EVIL IN THE EYES OF HER LORD — i. e. that she did not find favour in his eyes so that he might be induced to marry her (cf. Mekhilta).

אשר לו יעדה means: [IF SHE BE EVIL IN THE EYES OF HER LORD] WHO OUGHT TO HAVE DESIGNATED HER to be his wife and ought to have married her, her purchase-money serving as the money necessary to contract a marriage (כסף קידושין). Scripture hereby implicitly tells you that it is his duty to designate her for himself, and since it makes no mention of the manner in which the marriage is to be contracted it implicitly tells you at the same time that she requires no other rite of marriage than the passing of the purchase-money from the master to her father (cf. Kiddushin 19a, Bekhorot 13a).

והפדה means he shall afford her the opportunity to obtain her release from service — that he himself must cooperate in respect to the amount of her ransom. And what is this opportunity he has to give her? That he allows her a deduction from her ransom corresponding to the number of years she has served in his house, as though she were only hired by him. How can this be done? Supposing he had bought her for a maneh (one hundred shekels) and she had served him two years. We say to him: “You knew that she was to go free at the end of six years; it follows then that you bought the labour of each year for one sixth of a maneh. Now she has served you two years, that is the equivalent of one-third of the maneh: accept therefore two-thirds of a maneh as a ransom and let her go free out of your house (Kiddushin 14b).

לעם נכרי לא ימשל למכרה means that neither the master nor the father has a right to sell her to another Jewish man (Kiddushin 18a),

בבגדו בה SEEING THAT HE HATH DEALT DECEITFULLY WITH HER — If “he” means the master then these words signify: if he intends to deal faithlessly with her, i. e. if he does not intend to fulfil the commandment of “Jiud” (of designating her to himself). So also the father — he has no right to sell her to another man since he has dealt faithlessly with her as a father having sold her to this man (Mekhilta; Kiddushin 18b).

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.

L’AM NOCHRI’ HE SHALL HAVE NO POWER TO SELL HER. “Neither her master nor her father has the right to sell her to another [Hebrew man]. [literally: “unto a foreign people”] as signifying “unto a strange man,” i.e., to another Israelite. Thus the verse is stating that neither the father nor the master has a right to resell her. Ramban will question this interpretation. Seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her — if he [i.e. the master] intends to act deceitfully towards her and not to fulfill the commandment of designating her as his wife [or his son’s]. So also did her father act deceitfully towards her, by selling her to this master.” Thus far Rashi’s language. And if so, l’am nochri would be like l’ish nochri (to a strange man), but we find in all Scripture no parallel to such a usage [that am (people) should be understood in the sense of “man”]. Perhaps the letter lamed in the word l’am draws along with it a similar letter in the next word, thus making it: ‘l’am l’nochri’ he shall have no power to sell her, and the explanation thereof would be similar to the verse, Thou gavest him to be food ‘l’am l’tziyim’ (to the folk inhabiting the wilderness) where the second word l’tziyim explains: who is the folk? — the men who inhabit the wilderness; so here too He says, he shall have no power to sell her ‘l’am’, and He explains: who is l’am? — l’nochri, that is to say, to any stranger from the whole people [i.e., to another Israelite]. The term nochri here will then be similar in usage to the expressions: and thy labors in the house of a ‘nochri’ (stranger), which means in the house of another man; even from the ‘nochriyah’ (the strange woman) that maketh smooth her words, 2:16. meaning the woman who is not his wife. All this I have written in order to uphold the words of the Sages who say that a man is not permitted to sell his daughter twice into the status of a handmaid, thus holding to the explanation: since he has once dealt deceitfully with her [by selling her to such a status of a handmaid], he has no more the right to sell her.But I have seen in the Mechilta: “‘L’am nochri’ he shall have no power to sell her, — this is a warning to the court that he [i.e., the father] should not sell her to an alien [i.e., a non-Israelite].” It would thus appear from their language that this verse is not meant as an admonition against the father reselling her to this Israelite master or to another one, but is a prohibition against her being sold altogether [even the first time] to a non-Israelite, so that a man may not sell his minor daughter to an idolator as a handmaid. [It was necessary for this to be stated] because in the case of a Hebrew servant He said, and he sell himself unto the stranger who is a settler with thee, or to the offshoot of a stranger’s family, therefore it had to say that this should not be done to a woman. The reason for it is obvious. This surely is the plain meaning of Scripture, that after the father — the vendor — redeemed her from her first master, he cannot sell her to an idolator, and the same law applies to the original sale. Scripture, however, [had to state this prohibition in the case of a re-sale], because sometimes a man may very much want to redeem his daughter from a master who did not take her as his wife, and will want to sell her to an idolator for a year or two with the intention of then taking her out from him; therefore Scripture warned him against doing this. Or it may be that this expression [i.e., ‘l’am nochri’ he shall have no power to sell her] refers back to the beginning of this subject: And if a man sell his daughter to be a maidservant — he shall have no power to sell her to a foreign man. If so, then the Rabbis’ interpretation in the Talmud that a man may not resell his daughter into the status of a handmaid, [even to an Israelite], is derived [not from ‘l’am nochri’ he shall have no power to sell her, but] from the [apparently] superfluous expression: seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her. For to a non-Israelite he never has power to sell her; so why did G-d say: seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her, [since he cannot sell her even once to a foreign man], and the meaning of that expression is that since he acted once deceitfully with her by selling her into a status of a handmaid, he cannot do so another time? Therefore the Rabbis interpreted the verse thus: “to a foreign people he shall have no power to sell her [altogether], and when he hath dealt deceitfully with her [he also has no power to sell her];” that is to say, he shall have no power to sell her if he dealt deceitfully with her, for after he sold her once [to an Israelite], he cannot sell her again. There are many instances where the Rabbis interpreted the verses in such a manner. [Thus we find: Unto the stranger that is within thy gates thou shalt give it that he may eat it, or thou mayest sell it unto a foreigner — which Rabbi Meir interpreted]: “Read the verse thus: unto the stranger that is within thy gates thou shalt give it that he may eat it, or thou mayest sell it; thou shalt give it that he may eat it or thou mayest sell it unto a foreigner.” Similarly they interpreted here then shall she go out for nothing, without money, which, on account of the redundant language, [“for nothing,” “without money”] they made the basis for two additional ways of the Hebrew maidservant regaining her freedom: “she shall go out for nothing, and she shall go out without money;” thus establishing that she goes out to freedom when she produces signs of puberty, or signs of fuller development if she had no signs of puberty — this being that maturity of the barren woman, [who is incapable of conception], as is stated in the beginning of Tractate Kiddushin. The plain meaning of Scripture in this section is as follows: If a man sell his minor daughter to be a maidservant, she shall not go out as these menservants, [i.e., the Hebrew menservants] mentioned [above in Verses 2-6,] who go out to freedom in the seventh year and in the jubilee year: for the master can never send her away from his house if the maiden pleases him and she obtains kindness of him, but he is to take her for a wife as is his will. But if she pleaseth not her master, who has not espoused her to be his wife — for he who buys an Israelite’s daughter does so with the intention of taking her as his wife, thus she is under ordinary conditions designated for him; but now if her master does not desire her, then shall the father mentioned redeem her, for as soon as the master says: “I do not want to marry her,” it is forbidden for the father to leave her any longer under his authority, nor may he sell her to a foreign people in case he comes to deal deceitfully with her, for it is deceit for a man to sell his daughter except to someone who can marry her. Or the meaning thereof may be that anyone who sells his daughter [even to an Israelite], deals deceitfully with her.

Ramban (Nachmanides) on the Tanakh — English translation: “Commentary on the Torah by Ramban (Nachmanides). Translated and annotated by Charles B. Chavel. New York, Shilo Pub. House, 1971-1976” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.